


Let me carry the sky, the cross, with you. Let me pick up the bat.

by youngjusticewriter



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dead Robins Week, Gen, POV Damian Wayne, Police Officer Jason Todd, Protective Damian Wayne, Protective Jason Todd, Timeline What Timeline, there’s no time travel mentioned in this oneshot but it’s the backstory of this au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-21
Updated: 2019-11-21
Packaged: 2021-02-18 00:08:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21518680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youngjusticewriter/pseuds/youngjusticewriter
Summary: A noise clawed it’s way out of his brother’s bruised throat. It wasn’t a laugh, it most certainly wasn’t a giggle, but it was a noise made from having somehow found humor in Damian’s words. Why his brother thought what those men and women were doing was humorous Damian could not find it in him to understand no matter how much he tried to grasp comprehension. Yes, that Vicki Vale and the others didn’t know of his brother’s past with the Joker but still a police officer of their city was wounded after having to kill a man - no matter how well deserved it was to slay that monster it had still been the action of taking a life.That wasn’t something easily wiped from one’s soul no matter the circumstances, Damian of all people knew that.“I take it you met Vicki Vale then?” Jason asked, his eyelids drooping despite the conversation they were having.Damian snorted before his lips twisted into a grimace. “Met? I believe the word harassed would be more accurate Jason.”
Relationships: Jason Todd & Damian Wayne
Comments: 7
Kudos: 176
Collections: Dead Robins Week 2019.





	Let me carry the sky, the cross, with you. Let me pick up the bat.

The first thing his brother said to him was, “How did you get here? Actually, that’s  
not surprising. How did you even know what room I was in?” Jason’s words pronounced with a bit of a slur to them because of the pain medicine the doctor had him on but thankfully it, his speech, was still overall comprehensible. 

It wasn’t till Damian was finished looking around the small, clean (too clean to ever be any comfort to the patients) hospital room that he answered Jason’s questions. “I followed the vultures that carry mics and cameras.” 

A noise clawed it’s way out of his brother’s bruised throat. It wasn’t a laugh, it most certainly wasn’t a giggle, but it was a noise made from having somehow found humor in Damian’s words. Why his brother thought what those men and women were doing was humorous Damian could not find it in him to understand no matter how much he tried to grasp comprehension. Yes, that Vicki Vale and the others didn’t know of his brother’s past with the Joker but still a police officer of their city was wounded after having to kill a man - no matter how well deserved it was to slay that monster it had still been the action of taking a life. 

That wasn’t something easily wiped from one’s soul no matter the circumstances, Damian of all people knew that. 

“I take it you met Vicki Vale then?” Jason asked, his eyelids drooping despite the conversation they were having. 

Damian snorted before his lips twisted into a grimace. “Met? I believe the word harassed would be more accurate Jason.” 

“Yeah, you’re probably right about that. Any word from dear old dad yet?” Was the next thing his brother asked. It was surprising, Damian thought, that it had taken the older boy this long to ask that. 

“Nothing but a light has been left on for him,” was all Damian would dare say on the subject. Damian would never admit it but it took several moments for him to collect the bravery needed to ask the question that had been weighing on his mind ever since he had heard of the Joker’s death on the Gotham Nightly News. “...How do you suppose he’ll react?” 

There was a lot to that question. It wasn’t simply about the Joker’s death that made Damian ask that question. 

If father did not take well to Jason killing the Joker in self dense as an officer of the law how would he take to Damian’s past transgressions? Jason had on more than occasions had “tried to drill it in his thick skull” that Damian had - still was actually no matter how Damian refuted it - been a child. Yes, he had been killed but that blood was not wholly on his hands but rather it was on those that forged Damian into not only a weapon but had used him to kill others. 

It was that, Damian’s question on their father, that made Jason’s eyes snap open and stay that way. Laughter fell from Jason’s lips and what an ugly sound it was to hear. It was not the warm sound that often ended with his brother tossing his head back as he laughed. No, it was a bitter thing that made Jason’s shoulders shake as though he had been holding the sky, a cross, for far too long and no longer could even if it ended in his death, a death cause by being be crushed to the very weight he had been carrying. 

Damian wanted to cover his ears and shut his eyes but he didn’t. With a stubborn jut of his jaw Damian proceed to climb onto the hospital bed so that his older brother was not alone. (Damian was better with the strays Jason had allowed him to keep at their apartment than he was other humans but still he wasn’t a complete imbecile.)  
Maybe Damian could not bear the weight either, maybe Jason would not ever disclose what he was having to carry, but Damian could let him know he wasn’t alone and nor was he unloved. 

“You can go to sleep,” Damian informed his bruised, battered, and drugged older brother before he promised something dear to Jason. “If father visits I will make sure he will not disturb you.”

Jason jerked his head to the side which caused him to wince at the action. Despite his brother’s efforts, Damian could see the tears falling down his face. 

“Have I ever told you you’re a lot like how I was when I was kid?” There was something choked and small in Jason’s voice then as he spoke. “I use to stay outside of the house with a baseball bat and tried to threaten anyone asshole trying to sell to my mom. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t and I ended up needing help too because some of those dealers had no problems laying a hand on a kid.” 

It was a few moments before Jason continued, “I can fight my own battles. Whether you like it or not you’re a kid so it’s my job to protect you whether that mean keeping you off the streets at night or by fighting my own familial battles. I’m not trying to demean the fact you’re trying to protect me but I’m...being the adult to you that I should have had when I was kid with just a baseball bat.” 

“And who do tell will you let protect you?” Damian pressed with steel in his voice and his eyes on the purple bruises on the man’s neck. When Jason did not answer in some time (the medication he had been given really was strong, Damian mused, otherwise they would have argued for much longer), Damian repeated the words and vow he had spoken. “Go to sleep. If father visits I will make sure he does not disturb you. Also before you do rest do cease hogging the entirety of the bed. I need some space too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thursday: Found family or Returning home. 
> 
> * Why does Damian call Jason that instead of his last name? There’s an au I have in my mind for this story but didn’t explore that basically is: after Damian’s death somehow, someway Jason ends up waking back up in his past self’s body when Talia throws him into the pit. Instead of training to become the Red Hood Jason (who honestly doesn’t really believe this is real until several days after what I’m about to mention) proceeds to steal Damian (another dead Robin, another good soldier who shouldn’t have been a soldier nor should he have been a pawn in between his parents war with one and another) and get the hell out of dodge. After a few days it takes Jason to realize that this isn’t hallucination and I’m not going to wake up from this he decides to take another route on handling Gotham’s criminal underbelly. He becomes a police officer (maybe he’s the Red Hood too? but he most certainly is putting his foot down and telling Damian he can only get to wear a cape once he’s eighteen and not a day sooner) with the full intention of one day very soon he’s going to kill the Joker. 
> 
> Bruce and the family find out Jason is alive because they see him on tv (different name obviously) as the officer having killed the Joker. Cue Bruce not being a bad dad but rather a person who was put in a tough spot of trying to figure out at whether or not this really is Jason (and of it is and he’s been in Gotham this whole time why didn’t he come back home?) and handling the death of the Joker. 
> 
> Oh and that boy that Jason is raising? Yeah, that’s the baby Bruce thought Talia had lost all those years ago. 
> 
> So yeah if I ever do expand on this universe everyone would need a hug. 
> 
> Anyway, the reason why Damian calls Jason his first name when he doesn’t even do that to Dick is because Damian was raised by a batfamily member a few years earlier than canon.


End file.
